Murder in the Irish Channel (Chanse MacLeod Mysteries) (11 page)

“What does that have to do with Heather? He was fighting before he met her, wasn’t he?”

“Yes, well, you know he only married her because she was pregnant.” She made a face. “Yeah, Mom told me she was just some groupie who had a thing for fighters, she used to go with another one of them, and she hooked up with Jonny when the other guy wouldn’t marry her. She’s just trash, and she got pregnant and he married her and Mom bought that house with his college fund. I tried to talk him out of it, tried to talk Mom out of buying that house—that horrible little house, have you seen it? But Jonny won’t listen to anyone. Try to tell him he’s wrong—he’s so damned stubborn and used to getting his own way.” She sighed. “Jonny, I guess, has a lot of potential. The promoters think he can be a world champion or something, I don’t know, but he supposedly can go far, make a lot of money doing it. I didn’t want to know anything about it, like I said, it was just too barbaric for me, you know? Mom talked about it a lot, but I’ll be honest, I didn’t listen. When she would tell me about it, all I could think about was my baby brother getting all of his teeth knocked out or his brain scrambled. Mom was supportive of it all.”

“What about your brother? You said you two weren’t close anymore. Was he supportive of Jonny’s fighting?”

“They always say you’re not supposed to speak ill of the dead.” She got up and refilled my coffee cup. “Well, I’ve always thought that was stupid, you know? Like dying changes the fact that Robby was an asshole while he was alive? And that wife of his.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “Robby and Celia both thought—I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t say.” She started drumming her fingernails on the table. “Look, it’s not like I didn’t do my research into all of this, you know. When Jonny started fighting, I looked into it all. I’m not stupid.” She ran a hand through her hair. “It’s not like boxing, you know, where someone can make millions. These guys—the top guys might make six figures, but the majority of them don’t make shit. They risk their bodies, risk brain injury, and for what? I don’t get it. But Robby—Robby thought Jonny could be a star, a champion, one of the big-money fighters. That asshole Morgan Barras sold Mom and Robby and Jonny all a line of bull.”

“Morgan Barras? The billionaire?”

She made a face. “Yeah. I don’t know, I didn’t want anything to do with it, you know? Maybe they didn’t care if Jonny’s brains got scrambled, but I did.”

I pulled out my copy of the cashier’s check from Morgan Barras. “So, could this check have been a down payment of sorts?”

She raised her eyebrows. “Maybe.”

“Why do you think your mother has disappeared?”

“You know, I thought Jonny was overreacting when he called me on Friday morning. I just figured it had something to do with the church. She just couldn’t let St. Anselm’s go. I don’t understand it, never could—I’m lapsed Catholic myself—I send the boys to Country Day.” She made another face. “Mom wasn’t too happy about that, but what good did Sacred Heart do for me? I mean, really. Country Day is a better school, and they don’t try to brainwash the kids there like the Catholic schools do.”

“Did your mother seem worried, or concerned, the last time you talked to her?”

“I talked to her last Thursday morning. She was supposed to come over that morning when she was finished with her stupid vigil, but she called and canceled. She was really pissed about the church, and the arrests the day before.” She got up and started another pot of coffee. “But if you want to know what I believed, I thought she was focusing on the church because she was really stressed about the lawsuit.”

“What lawsuit?” I stared at her. “I haven’t heard anything about a lawsuit.”

She sat back down, with a sigh. “Jonny didn’t say anything to you about it?” She rolled her eyes. “After Dad was killed, Mom stayed home with Jonny until he started school. Once he was in school, she took a job with Marino Properties. She was a property manager for an apartment complex they owned on the West Bank somewhere. Cypress Gardens, or something like that.”

“I thought property managers had to live on the premises.”

She shook her head. “No, she had an office there, and was on call. There was a maintenance guy who lived on the property. The place was pretty much uninhabitable after Katrina.”

“But the West Bank didn’t flood.”

“Wind damage, is what Marino Properties was claiming. Roof damage, windows blown out, that kind of thing. The insurance company claims there was only about fifty grand or so that was caused by the hurricane—that Marino Properties is trying to collect millions fraudulently. Mom was going to be a star witness for Marino Properties. She didn’t evacuate, and as soon as she was able, she got over there and looked the place over. Went through every unit, took pictures and everything. The trial is going to start in about a month or so, I think.”

I stared at her. “Seriously? An insurance company is going to actually allow a Katrina claim dispute to go to court in Orleans Parish?”

That was so astoundingly stupid I couldn’t believe it. There were very few things New Orleanians agreed on: the Saints, and a hatred for insurance companies and everyone who worked for them.

“Yeah, Mom thought the insurance company was trying to ruin Marino Properties—that eventually they’d run out of money or something and would have to drop the suit. You know how insurance companies are complete and total scum of the earth.” She laughed. “But the firm representing them was willing to do it for a percentage of the final settlement.”

“What firm?”

“McKeithen, Fontenot, and Drake.”

I kept my face expressionless. I had dealt with Loren McKeithen before; he was an excellent lawyer whose devotion to his clients meant people who weren’t his clients couldn’t trust him. He was also gay, and worked hard for gay rights in Louisiana—which was pretty much a lost cause. “Do you think your mother’s disappearance might have had something to do with this lawsuit?”

She shrugged. “I don’t see how—insurance companies are scum of the earth, but I doubt even they would go that far. And I can’t believe they’d go so far as to kill.”

“How much money are we talking about?”

“I think twenty million, is what Mom said.”

I whistled. Twenty million dollars was an awful lot of money. “Who was the insurance carrier?”

“Some local brokerage put the package together—but the main carrier was Global, I think.” She gave me a rueful smile. “I really didn’t pay a lot of attention when Mom talked about it—and she didn’t really talk about it that much. But I know she wasn’t looking forward to going to court, and having to testify, and all that. But she did think Global was trying to cheat Mr. Marino.”

“Did your brother have any enemies?”

“Like I told you, we haven’t been close in years.”

I got out one of my business cards and handed it to her. “If you can think of anything else, give me a call.”

She walked me to the front door. “Do you think there’s a chance she might still be alive?”

“There’s always a chance,” I admitted. “But I don’t hold out a lot of hope, to be honest.”

She nodded. “That’s what I figured.” She wiped at her eyes and closed the door.

I got in my car and called Abby. “See what you can find out about a lawsuit—Marino Properties v. Global Insurance.” I filled her in on everything Lorelle had told me.

Abby whistled. “Insurance companies are bottom-feeding bastards,” she commented. “They won’t pay out unless you put a gun to their fucking heads. I’ll bet you they took her to keep her from testifying.”

“Abby, there wouldn’t be any point. I’m sure she’s given depositions. If she disappears or is killed or whatever, I’m sure they could have the depositions read into the court records.”

“I’m getting a law degree, remember?” I could almost see the look on her face. “And a statement doesn’t carry nearly as much weight with jurors as someone testifying in front of them—that’s Basic Courtroom 101, Chanse. Having that deposition read into the record? They don’t listen. Making them read it themselves? That won’t fly.” She sighed. “Jurors like to watch the person testify, see them be cross-examined, make up their own minds if the witness is lying or not. A deposition—especially if it’s from a key witness—well, the opposing lawyers can have a field day with that, you know, and can pretty much put enough doubt on the veracity of the deposition to make the jury disregard it almost entirely—and it’s just the kind of thing an insurance company would do.”

I chose not to argue with her. Abby’s hatred of insurance companies bordered on the pathological. I couldn’t blame her—no one with a heart could. Her family home down in Plaquemines Parish had been destroyed by the Katrina storm surge. The hurricane insurance policy refused to pay out because it was flood damage. The flood insurance company refused to pay out because the flood was caused by the hurricane. The battle had gone on for years—was still going on, in fact.

To Abby, the only good insurance company was a dead one.

I also strongly suspected the reason she wanted to become a lawyer was partly based in her family’s experience—and wanting to destroy every insurance company she could.

“Just find out the particulars of the case,” I said. “Have you turned up anything on Robby O’Neill yet?”

“Jephtha’s not quite done yet, but I can tell you one thing—Mr. Robby and his family were living pretty damned high on the hog,” she replied. “I mean, he worked as an investments counselor—but from everything I’m seeing so far, I don’t see how he could have possibly afforded the high life he was living. The mortgage on the house alone was ridiculously high—and there was a second mortgage, too.”

“Well, e-mail it all to me when it’s ready, and get on the lawsuit, see what you can dig up,” I told her, disconnecting the call.

I started the car and put it into gear.

“Thanks for agreeing to see me,” Loren McKeithen said, sitting down on my sofa and placing his black leather briefcase on my coffee table, “especially on such short notice.” He beamed at me, exposing his perfectly straight, bleached teeth. “It’s good to see you, Chanse—it’s really been a while, hasn’t it? I trust all is well with you?”

I didn’t say anything. I simply nodded and sat down in my desk chair, swiveling it around so that I was facing him. I leaned back, folded my arms, and waited to hear what he wanted.

He’d called my cell phone on my way back into the city from Lorelle’s, asking if he could meet with me as soon as it was convenient for me, but emphasizing
soon.
And much as I wanted to go question Mona’s boyfriend, I decided to put that off and agreed to meet with him at my apartment.

He never called unless he wanted something—and I was curious to find out what it was.

Loren McKeithen was one of the top attorneys in New Orleans, according to
Crescent City
magazine, and much as I was loath to admit it, would be the man I would hire if I ever needed a lawyer. He was a partner in McKeithen, Fontenot, and Drake, one of the most successful and well-known firms in New Orleans, with a gorgeous suite of offices in One Shell Square in the Central Business District. He was a gay man of mixed race, with toffee-colored skin, a shaved head that looked polished, and golden brown eyes behind gold-framed glasses. He was short, maybe five-four or five-five on a good day, and over the course of the years I’d known him, had become rather corpulent with an ever-expanding waistline.

I’d first met him at a gay rights fund-raiser many years ago—Loren had been an activist while in law school at Tulane, and as soon as he passed the bar he amped up his work for gay equality. He was an active member of the Louisiana Stonewall Democrats and was also heavily involved in the state party. He always generously opened his checkbook whenever he was asked, served on the boards of several gay organizations in the city, and was politically well connected. He frequently drove up to Baton Rouge to lobby for legislation designed to drag Louisiana out of the Middle Ages, which was often, he would say with a sad shake of his head, a fool’s errand. He was also a damned good lawyer. His first priority was whatever was best for his clients—and anyone who got in the way could, and did, get screwed. Loren and I had a precarious relationship—it’s hard to be friends or work with someone you can’t trust. He used to throw some work my way whenever he could, but after a case where he’d cheerfully thrown me under the bus because it was in his client’s best interest, we were finished. Since then, I kept my distance and never accepted any of his referrals or offers of employment.

My first instinct when he’d called was to tell him to go to hell and hang up. But he’d been so insistent he’d piqued my curiosity, so I figured what the hell.

I crossed my legs and watched him through narrowed eyes, not saying a word as he removed a bottle of rather expensive vodka from his briefcase. I resisted the urge to grin and kept my face impassive as he opened the bottle.

Back before he fucked me over, this had been a regular routine of ours. Loren was a big vodka drinker, but always complained I only had “rotgut” in my place. So he always would bring over an expensive bottle of vodka in his briefcase, and we’d have a drink or two while we talked over the particulars of a case. He never took the bottle with him when he left—yet always brought a fresh bottle the next time he came over. Vodka wasn’t my drink of choice, so I’d accumulated quite a few of the large bottles.